The Changing Use of Contingent Pay at the Modern British Workplace

Using nationally representative workplace data for Britain we show how employers have changed their usage of contingent pay schemes over the last quarter century. We find workplaces are more likely to use collective forms of pay system than they did in the past, and they are more likely to use multiple schemes in combination. Factors associated with each type of pay scheme have varied substantially over time. The changing incidence of each form of contingent pay primarily reflects changes in the behaviour of workplaces rather than changes in the sectoral composition of the economy.